@ Hamsworth: as a Canadian, I thank you for raising the relevance of Canada to this article.

@ Kevin Sutton, re: "At the moment in the UK, there are three major parties with about 80% of the vote that aren't crazy or enormously different. There's no reason a coalition government can't work."

Logically speaking, if 3 major parties with 80% of the vote "aren't enormously different", that argument also undermines the need for a coalition for purposes of "democracy" when balanced against a need for stability.

With respect, this is an oft-repeated argument by fans of electoral reform in Canada and (I'm assuming) the UK, and I must take exception to it as quite false. It assumes a homogeneity on the "left" that simply isn't there, as though the Conservatives are some kind of crazy odd-man-out. Part of this may lie with a uniform view of conservatism. Consider it simply from the view of fiscal conservatism:

Since New Labour, Labour are very analogous to the Canadian Liberals, a hodgepodge of centre-right and centre-left members who generally tinker with social programs but who also maintain pro-business positions - nominal tax cuts and the like. I assure you that if (to use the Canadian example) the Liberals and the New Democrats (the real socialists) merged, a large segment of Liberals (the "Blue Grits") would migrate to the Conservatives if these parties actually had to split. They may not normally vote Conservative, but in a left-right choice, they choose right. A similar analogy can play with Labour.

Similarly, what can you say about the LibDems? They may seem leftist, but they have a number of proposals which are appealing to libertarians, what I understand to be a particular branch of Conservatism. And while I cannot speak for Britain, the same goes for the Greens. In Canada, they're all over the map, less an environmental bastion than one of the ever-popular protest vote. I've met Green Party members (Canadian, of course) who were committed tin foiled hat people, I've met others with whom I've had the most engaging discussions of von Mises and Hayek. I've met Greens who were committed anarchists, and Greens who seemed totalitarian in viewpoint.

If the Conservative movement were destined to die out in a proportional representation system, we'd have seen it in, inter alia, Italy, Germany, France, the Netherlands...

What a distressingly poor article, unless, although this is hard to believe, it was deliberately playing devil's advocate. As most have pointed out picking Belgium and the European parliament as "poor" examples is disingenuous to say the least. A much better example would be Northern Ireland where the two most extreme parties have been forced to work together. And, blow me, it seems to be working.

Of course, coalitions have their own problems and factions and deals in the dark. What is different about this to the current UK process? Don't forget the lobbyists. What did Ken Clarke say about the Iraq war? "I believe this House is being asked to take a decision that in reality has already been taken elsewhere." The much-vaunted parliamentary process has long been broken by those elected to serve. Electoral reform of one form or another is essential for the UK and it would be more forward-looking of this newspaper to start thinking of what kind of reform would be good: PR? yes, but which form? devolution to what level? reform of the upper chamber?

There is one very simple, and cheap, way to ensure a thoroughly representative assembly. Ditch voting and select the members at random. With 500 people you will get a pretty accurate reflection of the population down to about 1% minority groups and you will get an almost perfect gender balance. The only people who will lose out will be the political hacks.

Strange to me that the article would not discuss Canada's experiences with minority government. Same parliamentary roots and traditions as Britain. The key in my view to Canada's relative success with this government form is the tradition enforced by the voters that all parties must co-operate to avoid unnecessary elections. The parties are constantly maneuvering for advantage but must not be seen to be obstructive to the workings of government or opportunistic in forcing an election. The only problem with minority is when major decisions of an " either or" nature must be taken. On the other hand, would Britain have gone into Iraq under a minority government? Quit worrying. The politicians work for you. Hold their feet to the fire mercilessly and beat them like rented mules.

The Labour Government is recovering this country, continuity is key. A coalition, as is likely to happen with have significant consequences on this continuous recovery process. It seems to me that if more people went to the polls on polling day then we would avert this problem, and the "real best man" would win.

Personally seeing as though this is an opinion page, VOTE LABOUR FOR SECURING THE RECOVERY, CONTINUITY IS KEY

@willstewart: You are right, I never meant to say that countries with proportional representation are more democratic (though there is certainly no evidence that they are less democratic). What bothers me is the message in many newspapers that if the the LibDems win a big share of the vote (and we move towards PR) this and that bad thing can happen.

For example, the underlying message of this piece is: "if we get PR we may end up like Belgium", which is complete nonsense. First, while I'm not denying Belgium has lots of issues with its separate French & Flemish communities, oversized bureaucratic culture etc., it's hardly anywhere as bad as the Economist portrays it + it's not at all clear how these problems would be applicable in the UK. Why not write a piece arguing: "Switzerland also has a PR system, we could be more like Switzerland". That would again be pretty nonsensical, puts the issue into perspective.

In fact the large majority of European countries have election rules that produce coalition governments, add Italy to those mentioned already. Maybe not that bad if the prime ministers' ego depends on coalition partners outside his own party. The British 'winner takes all' election system is the exception rather than the rule.

The European Parliament is not a good case to compare with because - as the 'Economist' observed correctly during its last election campaign - the EU parliament does not have the primary power of most other parliaments which is to elect, confirm or sack a real government.

"Take Mr Michel’s argument to its logical extreme and a Belgian government that included every parliamentary party would enjoy the support of 100% of voters, and be perfectly democratic."

And why not? If ministers are drawn proportionatel from the groupings represented in a legislature, what's wrong with that? This, in a way reflects the idea that just because up to 49% chose someone else, does not mean they should be completely shut out from government.

"Two of the three parties ended up with ministers back in the new government."

Despite their decrease in votes, this does not in any way mean that they deserve any chance at government. After all, it is not the number of people who chose not to vote for you this time round that counts, but how many people actually vote for you to represent them. Saying that large vote swings (say 30% to 20%) is the core of electoral representation effectively empowers that 10% over the other 20% (ignoring electoral dynamics in real life, where vote swings are not due to only a one-way flow of voters but the net resultof two-way flows).

"the socialists held private talks with the centre-right block that had beaten them and stitched up a deal to share out the European Union’s top jobs between them"

Again, are you contending that because left-of-centre parties lost 31 seats, they should be shut out completely? They are still represented by numbers far greater than 31. Furthermore, a reflection of the swing is made on the jobs the left got, i.e. the lesser of two jobs. The "stitch-up", after all also gave the presidency to the right.

"In Belgium or the European Parliament, fewer voters feel left out, but few politicians are accountable directly for very much at all."

"Alas, thanks to those baggy power cartels, and the endless deals they strike with each other, it is hard to cast a ballot that will have the slightest effect on the parliament’s actions."

How is that different from living in a safe seat in Britain, where single-digit vote swings can overthrow an entire cabinet and replace it with completely new faces?

And why is it that the life-cycle of parties in the mainland can seem to be shorter, i.e. more receptive to change, than the 3 old parties in the UK?

"It is true that coalitions can protect minority interests. But they can also give minorities disproportionate clout."

This is simply because the proportional system ends in elections. Once in the legislature, laws are again passed by FPTP. This is of course the main flaw with proportional representation.

You say these coalition countries work, which is true. But the blog post does not dispute this - what it says is that these systems are not obviously any more democratic than FPTP, which may also be true.

Sorry, but this piece seems completely one-sided or, to use what is already a cliche in the UK, like a bit of scare mongering. It is OK for the Economist to support the Conservatives in these elections, but at least don't claim this is impartial, objective analysis.

First, Belgium, with its complex constitutional structure, meant to satisfy both the French, the Flemish, the Germans and those from the Brussels region (which is bilingual) would have to work by compromise, regardless of the voting system. It was called not so long ago, by this very newspaper "not a real country" (insultingly, I think, but let's get over that). Why not give a number of pretty succesful countries with about the same level of economic development as the UK, that have been always governed by coalitions: the Netherlands, Switzerland, Austria, Denmark, Sweden, Finland (+ all the other nordic countries), even Germany (which had to deal with integrating integrate a large, poor East German part).

I consider this the most intelligent comment on the UK electoral system yet!

It is probably impossible to devise a totally fair and democratic system but it is not true that PR is necessarily a better or fairer system. What it does consistently tend to do is to hand too much power to small parties, which is why they like it.

But there might be an opportunity to come up with something better - perhaps people could vote a coalition preference as well as a party one, which would then define the result fully, eliminating the politician-only secret trading that cuts out the voter?

Excellent points have been made already but I am compelled to comment as well. If the purpose of the article was simply to compare the merits of democratic single-party rule to complicated coalition building and governance then the examples and descriptions provided would suffice.

However, the author has framed the context as the potential effect of coalition government on the UK. Using the Belgian and European Parliaments as examples is poor journalism at best and intentionally disingenuous at worst. As others have mentioned, Germany would be a much more appropriate example for comparison.

The arguement about democracy in FPTP v. more proportional systems has a strange definition of democracy. How is a system that allows a third of the electorate the power to choose who has total control anything democratic? Sure you can't know what deals a party might make in a coalition after an election. But you can't force a party to keep it's promises either.

Sure 100% is more of a coalition than 75%, but 35% (Resulting in a potential majority of seats) isn't even a majority of any kind!

Kicking the bums out may be hard to do with a proportional system, (Though that usually just reflects a swing of a fraction of the population anyway doesn't it?) but I'm curious as to what the Economist would say is the reason for the growth of small parties in the present political system. People have found that they can't throw the bums out because the other guys are the same bums or have the same positions. FPTP encourages a two party system which may still make the government responsible, but party leadership does not have to be as they know their party won't be replaced as part of the big two without an earthquake.

At the moment in the UK, there are three major parties with about 80% of the vote that aren't crazy or enormously different. There's no reason a coalition government can't work.

The article describes a small, divided country whose coalitions are usually made up of several parties. A more plausible comparison would be Germany, a country where the federal coalition is always made up of two centre-left or two centre-right or two centre-centre parties. That, failing the break-up of Labour and/or the Conservatives, is what Britain will probably be facing.

After that, a more equitable electoral system, whether multi-member electorates or alternative votes, would arguably improve British democracy.

Rather than selecting a couple of Europe's less effective cases the correspondent might want to have a look at the Swiss system. Coalition government; combined with frequent referenda on major policies that can come from public petition initatives.

Stable, representative and accountable.

Might not be as much fun to report on as regular lurches from Left to Right and back, and places more demands on the electorate to be informed (not that the Econmist can object to that).

If Britian is going to have electoral reform in the near future, hopefully those enacting the reform will have the sense to look around and copy the best bits of other systems? Not just find a few weak pionts to sneer at, and scaremonger about hung parliments the two dominant party's fear.

Interesting. You concentrate on a country [Belgium] that has a real problem containing sectarianism. Why is it that you chose to focus on this example rather than the many European examples where coalition or consenus is the norm?

Power in Britain, as you know, is already devolved in Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland and there is no real sentiment for a break up of the United Kingdom. Your example is a convenient stick with which to beat the idea of a hung Parliament but in effect it is less a coherent argument than a scare tactic.

You failed to answer the fundamental point here: why shouldn't coalition government work in Britain? You are arguing against the evidence and the status quo. In case you hadn't noticed. Britain already has a slightly left of centre consensus marked by popular support for Labour, the Liberal Democrats and the Greens. Your premiss implies that there isn't - something which is not borne out by the facts. The main loser in any move to PR or a FPTP-induced coalition is the Conservative Party. It is precisely for this reason that they loathe the idea of any change in the electoral system or Parliament. They know that the majority of people in this country will not vote for them and they know that their political fortunes largely depend on keeping things the way they are.

The point about any coalition is that it seeks to find the centre of gravity in the political system. If it didn't, under the PR voting system, there would be more "unpleasant" surprises than is presently the case. You picked a few of them in your article but because power is devolved to an extent in Britain, these factions would not have sort of power or influence you suppose. Whilst Plaid Cymru and the SNP might have pretensions to independence, it remains the case that most people are lukewarm about the idea.

The Spanish diplomat you quoted at the beginning of the piece is merely saying what everyone knows to be the case. It's a non-argument at best and a contrary, self-serving and a fact-defying one at worst to pretend otherwise.

How about writing a piece on successful coalition government at a time when that's what many British people hope for? Start in Germany, then go to The Netherlands, Austria, Spain (where it works in a context of strong nationalist tendencies and against the predations of ETA) and on to Scandinavia...

Whatever you might collude, it is difficult to imagine that we couldn't do better than the nominal democracy we have at the moment.